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than to the unwillingness of those whose duty it is to declare the
fact and apply the law; and who thus, by an ilitimed lenity, hold
out the inducement of easy escape to the criminal. The most
stringent provisions are of no avail where mistaken feelings of
sympathy, or a postponement, removal, or delay of the trial, can
prevent a just and speedy retribution. It is our misfortune, at
present, that our fundamental law, in some of its provisions, ena-
bles criminals thus to postpone, if not defeat the action of justice ;
and it is out of the power of the Legislature to remedy the defect.
But it is an evil of great magnitude, and the mention of it may
serve to awaken an inquiry into the possibility of some measures
looking to the relief of the community.

The provisions of our penal code are, in many particulars, be-
lieved by those whose opinion is entitled to respect, to be unsat-
isfactory in their results, and unequal in their application. Under
our system, which dates back for now nearly fifty years, crimes of
lesser magnitude are visited with a punishment far heavier than
is imposed on others, whose consequences, both in effect and
example, work infinitely more injury to the community: while
new offences and abuses of conceded rights, have become com-
mon, for which there is no punishment at all.

The right of the people to keep and bear arms, which proper-
ly understood and exercised, is one of the surest guarantees of a
free government, has been abused and perverted into the pernici-
ous custom of carrying concealed deadly weapons; and their ex-
hibition to the terror of, and their fatal use at the sacrifice, of the
lives of peaceful citizens. Nor are these occurrences confined to
occasions of sudden affrays or drunken brawls; but we have seen,
in the most populous portion of our State, that, arms have been un-
lawfully obtained and secreted, and carried about the person,
and unlawfully used on days of election; and peaceful citizens
and the officers of the law, in the discharge of their duty, have
been ruthlessly shot down. It is no palliation of these crimes to
say that they were perpetrated by those who are not sufficiently
used to our habits and laws, and have only repeated here the
acts of riot and bloodshed to which they were accustomed at
home. If we are compelled to receive that material, and submit
to its influence in other shapes, while it is becoming assimilated
to our own population, we are not prevented from taking mea-
sures to secure peaceful elections, the safety of our citizens, and
the personal security of officers in the discharge of their duty.
The records of our penitentiary house show that from this mate-
rial and from the vagrant free colored population of our State
comes the larger number of those who have filled it overflow-
ing.

Upon this matter of her free colored population, the State of
Maryland is deeply concerned. According to the last census
that class must now number more than eighty-five thousand with-